Tuesday, October 09, 2007

"Gossip Girl" Renewed For Full Season

The CW has announced today its freshman drama "Gossip Girl" based on the Cecily vonZiegesar bestsellers and executive produced by The O.C. creator Josh Schwartz has been renewed for a full season of 22 episodes.

The announcement was made following the release of DVR ratings for the week of September 17. "Gossip Girl" premiered on Wednesday, September 19 to 3.65 million viewers and got a 9% boost from DVR.

The following week the show lost a considerable portion of that audience scoring only 2.55 million viewers as viewers sampled the competing "Private Practice" on ABC and "The Bionic Woman" on NBC, but a week later in its third airing "Gossip Girl" went up again pulling in 2.8 million viewers.

The Upper East Side-set drama is doing well on the I-Tunes download chart and the network is also happy with its overall performance among young women and teenagers.

"Gossip Girl" is the first freshman drama series to get a full season pick-up. ABC's "Private Practice" and "Pushing Daises," CBS'"The Big Bang Theory" and NBC's "The Bionic Woman" are also strong contenders although the networks are expected to wait at least for third episode live ratings and premiere week DVR ratings to make renewal decisions.